On Monday, June 28, the Lakeland Library Cooperative’s new policy restricting holds on new books and nonprint materials goes into effect.

PLEASE NOTE: Kent District Library cardholders will still be able to place holds on all new KDL books and nonprint items.

This policy change is being made due to cuts to the Lakeland budget. It is necessary in order to reduce the volume of materials being transported in delivery between libraries. If you are not a KDL cardholder, please contact your local home library to ask how this Lakeland policy affects you.

I’m so confused. I don’t know how all these changes affect me. I have a Thornapple Kellog card, but they don’t have a real good selection. I use Caledonia 80% of the time and Cascade the other 20%.I often order books on CD and pick them up at one of those libraries, usually Caledonia.

Can I still use Cascade and Caledonia to borrow books?
Can I still order books and pick them up there?
If not, what are my options?

Jane – you can still use Cascade and Caledonia on a “walk-in” basis. You can check out books and other materials with your Thornapple Kellogg card. However, you cannot still order books and pick them up at a KDL location since your home library is Thornapple Kellogg. You will have to place and pick up holds there. http://llcoop.org/directory/mid.pdf

This is a Lakeland Library Cooperative-wide decision. All patrons must pick up their holds at their “home” library.

Is the “home library” always the one that is geographically closest to a person, or is the home library where a person got his library card? Is it possible for a card-holder to change his “home library” status from one branch to another?

I am confused because I just placed a book on hold that they have to send from a different library. I place the hold on thursday June 24. The library that it is being shiped to is the Grandville Branch. Will I still be able to pick up my book from the Grandville Branch if it is being shiped from another KDL library?

I realize that there are money issues, and requiring all materials to be returned to the same library you checked something out of is understandable, but not allowing those outside of the county to request audio/visual items and prohibit them from even requesting that they be delivered to another KDL library, makes it very difficult for those of us who rely very heavily on the library for our homeschool materials. This is not going to help us with the reading programs either. I am currently listening to two different book series and my local library is not able to have more than a couple of each series on the shelf. Do you expect me to drive all around the county to pick up the cd’s I want to listen to? I think the new policy has gone too far! This is not much better than the dark ages when I was a kid and was limited to the materials in my local library.

Wow, this is even worse than when KDL and GRPL separated their catalogs. GRPL issued my card, but they have a poorer selection – there have been several books I couldn’t get through their libraries. And since it was such a pain to keep track of which book came from which library system I quit using GRPL altogether and have only used the nearest KDL. I know my tax dollars don’t go there – I can’t really help that. But I might even consider an annual subscription fee to be able to still use the KDL system. Being allowed to grab things off the shelves doesn’t really mean much since new books are never in and libraries rarely own all the books by an author in a series, even if it’s an older one.

I’ve stated this before, this is the worst policy decision the co-op has ever made. Now I’m going to have to spend more money driving to a library that’s further away from me because it’s my “home” branch, and the co-op will have expend more funds shipping my requests to a branch that’s out in the boondocks instead of to the more centralized branch that I normally use.

Steve,
We just want to clarify – If you are a KDL cardholder, you may request to change your pick up location to a more convenient KDL branch.

If you are not a KDL cardholder, your pickup location is the library that you support with your taxes. In that case, you are right – your home library may be located in an area less convenient to you than a KDL branch.

This is an awful policy. Since my home library is through GRPL, I’m essentially being cut off from all libraries because the GRPL has a very limited selection and I will no longer be able to place holds at KDL. Instead of encouraging people to use libraries, you’re now just cutting them off. Ridiculous.

I am a KDL cardholder and I’ve just tried to place a hold on a fairly new DVD my son enjoys…we reserved this identical movie a few weeks ago, and he would now like to watch it again. This new request was denied, though, and I don’t understand why. It’s a movie other KDL branches are listed as having…why can’t I reserve this? I guess I don’t understand the new policy? I thought holds between KDL libraries were acceptable?

You are correct — there should be no problem with holds on items that KDL owns. Call our Patron Services Department at 616-784-2007 and we can try to figure out what the issue was with the particular item you were trying to request.

I have to agree with everyone, the new policy’s sure do stink! I have a non KDL card, and am very much going to miss ordering in the new materials to my home library, BUT i also understand the reasoning, as much as it does stink, i have to thank the libraries for keeping delivery in some way! atleast older material and items for reports can still be interloaned. I envy the KDL system, atleast all KDL libraries can still interloan between locations. My library got cut down to only being able to use what new materials we have, and as of now, if one of our millages doesnt pass…we wont even have a delivery system any more! I would rather be able to drive to a KDL location and check out their items, then not have a catalog system that disallows that. Hopefully the state can turn around in the future and things can go back to the way they were.

As members of Ionia Community Library, my children and I are pretty much devastated by this news. I lost my job, we are struggling to pay just the necessary bills, and there is no money for any extras. We used the library to get movies, computer games, audio books, and of course, books. Each of my children easily reads 10-15 books a week. Ionia Library, while staffed with the best people in the world, has nothing. No movies, no computer games, and very few new books. We said a long time ago that even if delivery and pick up to our library was less often, we would still be glad we could do it. Going to the library was pretty much a highlight of our week, and I doubt we will go much at all now. There should be a better solution than this.

Although I don’t like it I can understand the policy change when it comes to shipping movies and games to other branches, what I absolutely HATE about the new policy is not being able to ship printed materials to any library with-in the co-op. All this is going to accomplish is to decrease the amount of children who read books.

Also, I’m a little curious to see how many movies and CDs are going to be lost in the shuffle due to the policy change. I had quite a few movies on hold weeks prior to the change going into effect and it’ll be interesting to see how many become reported as lost since videos can no longer be shipped outside of the KDLs.

I understand Lakeland is cutting services and imposing limits, but why does KDL want to continue with Lakeland Library System? What benefits does the KDL cardholder actually receive… especially in light of the new changes?

It may have been a wonderful concept at the time the KDL joined LLS, but in this economic climate with dwindling property values, increasing fuel and maintenance costs, and environmental concerns over carbon footprints, it’s not understood why KDL continues to be a member. KDL/LLS may very well be cutting transportation expenses from the budget, but you are increasing the carbon footprints of all users who must now travel to their “home” library.

KDL seemingly has the vast majority of materials and seems really self supporting within the district. (I certainly didn’t need to receive books from White Lake, Lake Odessa, or White Cloud because all the KDL books were busy elsewhere. So what if I had to wait a couple extra weeks to get them from KDL.) Anyways, the confinement KDL materials to KDL makes sense… but the restrictions imposed upon local non users seems harsh.

Perhaps GRPL had the correct idea after all because they questions why they were paying big bucks for the privilege of shipping their material elsewhere in LLS instead of to the patrons actually using GRPL libraries. Also, they continue to demonstrate the philosophy of serving the community, i.e. they don’t differentiate whether one is GRPL, KDL, Tallmadge, Georgetown, Ottawa County, wherever. It matters that the patrons having a legitimate library card, order, pick up and return to local GRPL branches. Perhaps KDL administrators should be checking out as to whether GRPL’s decision was financially feasible.

While we appreciate all of your feedback, we ask that you keep your comments constructive. This is an issue that has an impact on all Lakeland Library Cooperative members. The libraries in our communities all have something unique to offer and we hope that one positive result of these changes is that you will take the chance to discover these offerings for yourself. While these changes will certainly make things less convenient for some, they will still allow for a tremendous amount of resource sharing among member libraries.
Cheryl Garrison
Interim Director

Curious Cardholder:
All libraries must belong to a Cooperative to receive State Aid. The Lakeland Cooperative serves libraries throughout West Michigan with a variety of services. For Kent District Library, the primary service Lakeland Cooperative provides is the shared online catalog. Although Grand Rapids Public Library uses a separate catalog (Evergreen), they are still a member of the Lakeland Library Cooperative.
Cheryl Garrison
Interim Director

Steve,
The only items that have hold restrictions are nonprint and new books. All other items, including childrens’ books, will accept holds and we will ship them to your home library.
Cheryl Garrison
Interim Director

“Do you expect me to drive all around the county to pick up the cd’s I want to listen to?” Wow. Just, wow. I for one am sorry KDL has to cut services. But their budget has been slashed too. I’m sure they are not happy about having to do it either. I thank KDL for doing what they can.

My family and I love the library and thank everyone who supports and helps to give us this wonderful resource! I too was disappointed when hearing about the Hold Policy Update, as I knew we were so lucky to have this resource, but I’m hoping this will work out. I am going to see how it goes and hope for the best.

We are always grateful for the service KDL provides to our family. It is a crazy time we live in- plenty of government waste while at the same time decreasing funding for important institutions like libraries. Hopefully this will be a wake up call to all who use the library. You certainly have my support for a millage to provide the funding you need. Thanks again!

I feel this policy is outrageous. I have been a governmental employee in the past and this is a typical responce when budgets are cut. When I worked for the school system, the first item on the chopping block was bus service. The idea was to generate as much pain as possible for your “customers” so that they would demand services be restored at whatever cost. A number of millages have been passed in recent years but here we are. Lovely building projects seem to be very popular. I would suggest more input and involvement from your customers on budgetary / service decisions. I would like to see government operate as a private business must, instead of continually running to the bottomless well of “free” tax dollars. This having been said, I do commend the volunteers and staff for a fine job.

As a patron with a GRPL card but who very much enjoys browsing and picking up my hold items at a KDL branch (East Grand Rapids), I would be more than willing to pay a fee to be able to continue to visit the EGR branch. I will still visit there often to check out books on the shelf, but it’s going to be tricky to keep track of which books came from which library. I’ll do it, though, because I love the EGR branch. I’m not a fan of this new plan, but I understand the reasons. I hope it may be resolved in time and that we can go back to choosing our favorite library.

Like many others commenting here, I am a GRPL cardholder who previously used a KDL library (Walker) as much or more than my home library. I understand that there was a cost involved in transporting hold items from other libraries to Walker for me to pick up. I also fully understand the cost-cutting necessity of discontinuing this service, especially for someone like me whose taxes do not go to Walker library.

However, why can I no longer place a hold on a Walker library item if I am willing to go to Walker library to pick it up? This seems like an unnecessary restriction unlikely to have any cost-savings. I strongly hope you will reconsider this aspect.

If you want to save money why don’t you cut the hours of all of those “Chatty Cathys” who you can time with a calendar and seem to always have plenty of “down time” at the local branch near my work. (I won’t mention the branch).
I live a mile and half into Ionia County so I am stuck with Saranac as my “home library” even though my kids attend Lowell Schools (a block from the Alto Branch) and I pay property taxes for a bunch of stuff in Kent County: Lowell School System, Kent ISD, GRCC etc. The Alto and Englehardt branches are much more convenient. I don’t need books shipped anywhere. I just want to be able to place holds at KDL branches. I will be happy to pick them up at which ever branch the book is located at. Thanks!